North Korea shuts down Yongbyon reactor - US

North Korea has told the United States it has shut down its Yongbyon nuclear facilities, the US State Department said yesterday.

"We welcome this development and look forward to the verification and monitoring of this shutdown by the International Atomic Energy Agency team that has arrived in North Korea," said spokesman Sean McCormack.

A South Korean tanker carrying 6,200 tonnes of fuel oil arrived early yesterday at the port of Sonbong on North Korea's northeastern coast, the Unification Ministry in Seoul said. McCormack said US negotiators looked forward to the next step of that February 13 agreement, in which North Korea "has committed to declaring all its nuclear programmes and disabling all its existing nuclear facilities." A team from the UN nuclear watchdog agency arrived in North Korea yesterday ahead of a planned shutdown of its atomic reactor under a disarmament deal and just hours after delivery of a promised cargo of fuel oil. On arrival in Pyongyang, the team from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) declined to answer questions from waiting reporters, the Chinese news agency Xinhua reported.

US nuclear negotiator Christopher Hill told Japanese media he expects North Korea will produce a list of all its nuclear facilities in the coming weeks or months.

The leader of the IAEA team said earlier in Beijing they would be going straight to Yongbyon yesterday to begin work at the complex, which produces weapons-grade plutonium. North Korea had informed China, its main benefactor, that the reactor would be shut down tomorrow, the Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun reported, quoting a source involved in six-country talks aimed at ending the North's nuclear ambitions. A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said Beijing was unaware of a date for the shutdown and believed this would be a topic when the six-way talks resume in Beijing on Wednesday. The talks, at which North Korea sits down with the United States, South Korea, China, Japan and Russia, are expected to map out the next stage of the disarmament process.

The five have promised massive economic aid and better diplomatic ties if Pyongyang scraps its nuclear arms programme. IAEA director Mohamed El Baradei has said it would take about a month to complete setting up the monitoring equipment.